Each of us has a personal story that we tell and retell, not only to let others know who we are but to remind ourselves of our own value.
Last week, I got a message on Twitter from a woman named Kathy Korman Frey, someone I hadn’t thought about it a while. She runs the Hot Momma project, a business and mentorship website with a focus on women. Marilyn Terrell of National Geographic fame had asked Kathy if she could recommend someone for traveler of the year.
This totally made my day!
Who knows what will eventually turn out with traveler of the year, but I cannot tell you how honored and grateful I was — and am — to be mentioned.
Another huge plus of this discussion? It reminded me to go back to the Hot Mommas Project Case Study website to read the case study I’d written.
What is this case study you ask?
This part of the Hot Mommas Project focuses on creating and finding mentors for women and girls. The case study profile walks you through questions designed not only to help you write your story, but to examine yourself, your personal life and your career.
Writing my own case study was eye opening! Noah, LIla and I had just finished two years of travel following two years of my being a stay-at-home mom. I felt kind of lost, maybe a bit stuck, and I had no idea what would happen next.
Writing this case study grounded me and opened my eyes to the value of my past experience — particularly the value of being a stay-at-home mom. Even more, it helped me shape the path into my future.
Five years ago, just a month or two after moving to Salta, I could not have predicted my life would take me to Wichi villages where I’d teach photography and help build gardens. Who knew I’d speak on an Internet Week panel in NYC about how to balance business, writing and being a parent. I only imagined that five years later, I’d be pregnant with a second child and writing a book about the first.
You can, however, see the seeds of everything planted in my case study.
Thus, it is with great pleasure, I share with you my story.
__________________
I’ll Tell You Why Not!
One sunny day in Brooklyn, we sat drinking mimosas over brunch. We chose that place on the corner. You know the one that used to be excellent, then the quality went south but you keep forgetting and find yourself peering down on soggy scrambles.
“Let’s travel,” Noah said to me. I took another sip of mimosa. “I mean it,” he continued. “Let’s just sell everything and go.”
“Yeah, right,” I laughed out loud.
To which he asked, “Why not?”
All right,” I told him. “Let’s do it.” So we sold or donated just about everything we had, and away we went with only a few suitcases and a couple of backpacks.
The following is an account of what went through my head in the split seconds between Noah’s question and my final answer:
Q: What will we do with our apartment?
A: Sell it. I know. I know. You’re saying no, but what’s keeping you in the apartment? It’s expensive, crowded. You’re closed in by concrete and people. I know life is good and comfortable here. You have friends, family. But really, are you happy with it?
Q: What about our stuff?
A: You don’t need that much anyway.
Q: I’ve always wanted to travel.
A: Here’s your chance.
Q: But I’m scared.
A: Of what?
Q: Of the unknown. Of failure. I’ve never known anyone else who’s done anything like this.
A: Is that really a reason to say no?
I looked back at the ten years prior to that moment.
What happened to me? I shook Bob Dole’s hand at the 1996 Republican National Convention when I interviewed him for MTV New Online. At 23 years old, I was one of the youngest producers they had. Then, I ditched all that to go back to school for an MA while I began and ran my own internet consulting company and worked on my first novel. I studied plant biology and medicinal properties, taught literature, poetry and creative writing to students of all ages and even found time to volunteer.
How did I become this person whose days were spent cooking, cleaning, putting things away, washing, straightening, cleaning, putting away and then putting things away?
I’ll tell you how. It was a choice. I was lucky enough to be able to choose between returning to work or not. I loved pregnancy and motherhood, spent hours planning, thinking, writing down every little thought and feeling. I spent my days rocking, walking and holding Lila. At night, she slept in our bed.
I was no longer the same woman I had been when Lila was born. Nor the woman before that. Without noticing, I had somehow changed and just then realized I had no idea who this new person was or who she could be.
For a baby, everything is a learning experience. A wall. A red thingy dangling from the ceiling. A handful of cheerios. The older you get, the more you know, the wider your experiences need to be in order to stimulate development. That’s why the idea of traveling when you’re young and then settling down always seemed so strange to me. Why must we stay in one place? Because we’re not in college anymore? Because we have a child?
“All right,” I told him. “Let’s do it.” So we sold or donated just about everything we had, and away we went with only a few suitcases and a couple of backpacks.
OK, maybe it wasn’t quite that easy. The moving process is arduous; you weigh, measure and reevaluate everything in your life as you one by one pull up your roots to go, and like ripping the roots of an enormous tree from the ground, you will inevitably leave something behind. You will also be free in a way you never imagined.
We finally waved goodbye to Brooklyn on a warm sunny day in May. First stop? Graceland!
Lila in a hammock in Panama
Since then, we have traveled on three continents and through ten countries. I have seen morning runs through a cloud forest and meditated on a huge flat rock in the middle of the Mediterranean. I watched my child run barefoot on the tiny island of Wichaub Huala with the Kuna Yala Indian children, and saw her delight as a crowd of young faces peered up at our balcony every morning, waiting for her to join them. Noah played basketball with the men, and the women taught me to tie traditional beads around my arms and legs.
Two weeks ago, we arrived in Salta, Argentina on a tip from an old biology professor of Noah’s. Now, we’re staying with a community of people who, well, I’m not entirely sure what they do. We’re still learning Spanish so much is lost in translation, but it seems to have something to do with gardening.
It is beautiful here. The roof of our house overlooks the valley and out to the foothills of the Andes. There’s a vegetable garden, chickens, rabbits, two cats and a mangy dog named Maxi. Lila is clear in what she wants. “Why do we keep going places and then not staying,” she asks. “I want to go to school and have friends.”
I only wish I were as clear in myself as my almost five-year-old. Me? I wave, process, think, debate. My head chews and chews and chews.
Q: We’ll have no income.
A: You’ll have a chance to write and work on that new project idea of yours. Those will make money.
Q: They might, but I don’t know when.
A: Take a chance.
Q: I’m scared. What if I fail? It’s been so long since I’ve worked.
A: This again? You will fail. Everyone fails and falls at some time. As long as you get up again, then you have not really fallen.
For the first time in my life, I am not crowded in a small apartment in a tall building in a land of metal and concrete. I can breathe here. There’s horseback riding, hiking and mountain climbing. I’ll finally be able to finish a collection of short stories I started while traveling and begin that novel based on Lila’s baby journal.
At the market in Salta
Oh, oh, and then there’s our new camera, so many buttons and whistles. I’ve always wanted to try my hand at photography. I can’t think of a better place than this to begin. Then, of course, there’s that new project – an expansion of my blog into an online art exhibition space for writers, photographers and artists of all ages but specifically children.
There is much to appreciate, learn and give back to this new community of ours. We’ll help in the garden, become fluent in Spanish, and since the house they’ve given us isn’t quite finished, we’ll learn to build houses as well.
“There is a certain inevitable futility in indecision,” says Voltaire.
“You’re right,” I reply. “Why not?”
__________________
We don’t know where we’re going until we understand where we’ve been.
There is incredible power in writing your own story. Thus, I highly recommend writing your own case study. Or apply for a Fulbright Fellowship. Or to be a TED Fellow. Or something else entirely. It’s not about winning accolades or awards — although that’s always nice — this is about defining yourself, your writing, honing your skills and shaping what you want in your life and work.
Plus, you never know when an idea will grow into a new project, a memoir or something else.
